TV romances are much more exciting when they're off-limits, and no relationship is more controversial (or risqué) than the student-teacher affair. On ABC Family's Pretty Little Liars, this drama quota is filled by Ian Harding as Ezra Fitz, Rosewood High's resident hot teacher who woos one of his students (played by Lucy Hale). Yet while Harding's Fitz may break school policy on the small screen, his character is for the most part the do-gooder type—and the ideal boyfriend to boot. But according to Harding, as Liars continues in its third stretch, we can expect even more secrets to come to the fore: "I was just sitting down and chatting with Marlene King (the show's creator) and she said that a few other people are going to have some very big secrets come out [this season]. And I was like, 'Oh wow. We just upped the ante.'"

To watch the drama unfold, tune in to ABC Family on Tuesdays at 8 pm EST.

Age: 25

Provenance: Herndon, Virginia

Relationship Status: "Living life."

Sweet Virginia: "I was able to get the small-town feel and yet I was only 20-30 miles outside of Washington D.C., so I was able to get a little bit of country and then, when we needed to, get a sprawling metropolis, so I don't really have any regrets with living in Virginia...not like I had a choice."

On growing up in a "military family": "Whenever you say 'military family' we have this idea of my dad having a buzz cut and wearing camouflage to football games...I never played football. My dad grew up in southern California and was a raging liberal. My mom is in the navy and my dad works for the army, but I never called them 'sir' or 'ma'am' or anything like that, and we never really moved around a lot because both my parents were stationed in D.C."

Favorite school subjects: "English was great because I could just write my opinion and that was good enough, I was terrible in Math even though I had amazing Math teachers. My favorite subject was either English or History. I had a really awesome high school education."

Hot for teacher: "It was awkward because the high school that I went to, my aunt taught at, it was this private boy's school in D.C. There were one or two teachers that I had the hots for, but never fully expressed my feelings because my aunt was always watching."

On whether he identifies with Ezra Fitz: "Yeah, minus the teenage girlfriend. He's becoming less and less of a pushover, he's such a good boyfriend that I'm wanting him to get a little rougher because, okay, yes, we're in the clear now in terms of 'this is not a creeper relationship,' so it's cool if he has some skeletons in the closet; it's cool if he's not always great."

Age is just a number: "I typically go for those who I just connect with, and if you are 20 or 42, if we really have something amazing, then that's what matters. It kind of doesn't matter to me. I mean, it matters to me if you're like 15."

Why people watch Liars: "It's not just for titillation. I feel like other shows that are in this genre sometimes have things happen just to be crazy or just to be sexy and it's really just a complete series of non sequiturs, but I think what's really awesome is that this does have a lot of heart to it, which is why everybody's cool with a 24-year-old dating a 17-year-old and that's why the LBGT community has really taken to this show because it shows a teenager that is really dealing with his sexuality not for its taboo or its titillation, but just a person trying to figure it out as if it's heterosexual."

On what's next: "Pretty Little Liars is very all-consuming of my time, but I guess it's a great problem to have…there have been other things that have come that were on the table and then were not. I got very lucky with the show right off the bat and so now I'm kind of playing catch-up. I'm going out and meeting people and they're like, 'Congratulations, you're on this show! Now let's see if he can act."